This Friday between 12:00 and 1:00 El Presidente will call to order the final CDApS meeting of 2016.  Special guest Donnie will be in attendance.

We will be listening to three open baffle speakers - my biamped, Tang Band 1808/Augie combo, Donnie's crossed over Tang Band/double Emminence Alpha combo and El Presidente's recently acquired/built Betsy Baffles.

We'll also have my DIY monoliths to compare the OB systems to box speakers with a horn kicker.

We'll have at least three amps: Jupe'd, non UFO Rachael, copper jup'ed Torii III and El Presidente's ZMA,

I will be looking for feedback on my treated room and how other members feel about upsampling to DSD in Audirvana.  I feel that combo improves the sound of my OBs and would like a second opinion there as well.

All hail Donnie who is making the trek from the frozen farmland to the south and slepping his OBs to face the music (so to speak) of the CDApS crew.




Should be a good time.

I also just got my Christmas Present - a new (used) Mac mini with an i7 quad core processor so dsd upsampling should not be a problem. Sounds pretty good even without the linear power supply installed.  Not sure I will try that install before tomorrow.

Also bring the Betsys and some music.

Not sure how we will prop the Betsys up. I'd like to hear them.

I'll write more later but we had a good session today.

We ended up listening to Rachael and the zma plus my Monoliths, my OBs, Donnies OBs, and the Betsys plus a few input tubes and Eric's vintage 807 power tubes.

In summary we gravitated quickly to the OBs and Donnie's looked and
Sounded great.   Not sure why but they had better treble extension than my OBs even with the same primary drivers.  My bottom end was tighter with the Augies.  Overall though, came away impressed with the bass from Donnies double woofer design given he is not bi-amping.

On input tubes, Steve's cheap Chinese tubes were richer than the more expensive 6n23ps.  For me, the funky 807's power tubes stole the show.  A good match for single drivers.

Betsys won the size of soundstage award but I think we all came away with the opinion that they needed a super tweeter or more up top.  Still silly good for the money.

Thanks to Donnie for making the long drive.  

It was a combination of factors but this was the first time that I heard Rachael and the ZMA back to back where I didn't feel the ZMA was leagues ahead of the Rachael.  There were still more details and grunt in the ZMA but I didn't leave with as much amp envy.  Don't know what that is worth other than that's it's a testimonial to achieving pretty good sound with any decware amp.

Another comment about the day is how good this 2012 Mac mini sounds compared to my 2010.  The 2012 has a ssd drive and 8gb of ram but so does the 2010.  Even without a LPS like I have on the 2010, it's significantly better sounding.  The quad core i7 also chews through DSD conversions without breaking a sweat.  I am not feeling the need to do any mods right now.

I hope Eric and Donnie will post some pictures.

I have some personal (Redhead) things to deal with, and I have some actual *work* work to get done and submitted to my boss before the end of the day, but I'll chime in briefly and upload photos tomorrow.


It was great seeing Donnie - his big OB speakers really look amazing! And sound just as good as they look! Good job my friend! Hearing them right after Palomino's OBs though, it was clear his bass, while full, was a bit less controlled. I'm betting if you get an outboard amp like what Pal has, you could dial that in and not need to mess with the crossovers.

Palomino's room sounded great - I've heard it sound better, but only by a hair, and back when that was the focus (room and imaging). Right now the room just sounds good with everything! Every speaker we put in there sounded great, and we all heard stuff in familiar recordings we'd never caught before. Hell, after Donnie left, we played around with some tubes and played some tracks from a couple of my recent favorite albums (ALT-J An Awesome Wave) and introduced Pal to Bon Ivers first couple of albums, which I've been listening to a lot lately, but the room treatment brought out so much detail, instrument separation, and layering that I'd never heard before in these well worn albums.  Donnie seemed pretty blown away by what room treatment can do, and I think he's been converted.  ;)

As for the Rachel....I've always liked the Rachel, and always felt she sounded silky smooth and (as Steve would say) doesn't suck. But with all the tweaks Palomino has put into his system, and the tube choices, and cabling, room treatments and everything, I swear the Rachel was in the realm of the ZMA. While surprising, it kind of wasn't a surprise at the same time. I'm betting that the Rachel with UFO transformers would squeek out the detail that the Rachel is lacking in comparison to the ZMA, and make that amp even more amazing (see how I'm trying to spend your money?).  We've had days where the ZMA just didn't sound head and shoulders above everything else, but it has never sucked...this latest listening session, everything sounded awesome...which I guess is a good thing, because having such a great setup with a well treated room...if something sucked, you'd know it!


My Betsy speakers really surprised me that the big room filling sound carried over to Pal's room. We could pretty much drop them anywhere and they sounded silky smooth, and HUGE...but after hearing Donnie's and Palomino's speakers, it was clear how much top end the Betsy baffles were missing compared to the much more expensive full range drivers they were using. I hate adding anything to a full range speaker, because the whole point is pulling out detail and not having time/phase smearing with a crossover - but I'm hoping I can get away with a supertweeter with nothing but a cap on it and bring these budget OBs up to a much higher level...they already punch way above their price range.


We really need to get some more local guys over for CDApS meets. This was great sharing and showing off, and having extra ears to help dial in and verify what we're hearing and doing. We just can't expand our knowledge and improve our systems in a vacuum.

Oh yeah, and I think those 807 tubes were a hit! I left a quad of ceramic base military 807, and a quad of 40's vintage NOS 807 with adapters at Pal's house so he can play with them in the Rachel. They really brought out the smoothness in the Rachel, but kept all the detail and grunt that made the Rachel sound like a mini-ZMA!

I hadn't ever thought about a sub for my garage stereo. That would be pure evil. Maybe something that would thump at about 120 db! I would be the scourge of the area!

Did you guys do any comparisons between PCM and DSD upsampling in Audirvana?  I am in the same boat as Palomino having recently upgraded to. 2012 Mini.  In my case, DSD upsampling has proven to be a big benefit.

I'm just throwing some pics up - not much time to comment much.


Slightly off-kilter pano of the room. You can see all the diffusers.





Just getting settled in.





In another thread we were talking about tube storage, and I said Palo had this plastic thingy he holds tubes in so they don't roll around, but I didn't know what it was....turns out, it's a staircase from a Barbie house! LOL





He also stuck his "spares" in left over foam cutoffs from his diffuser builds...I like seeing them all out.

My slapped together Betsy speakers in 24" x 24" x 3/4" MDF panels, roughly cut and nicely routed so the drivers are almost flush mounted. Palomino had me pull my cheesy monster zip cord off so we could use his Western Electric (or whatever it is) copper speaker wire to try and keep everything same/same between speakers.  I think we all liked how these sounded, and all missed the high end extension. They certainly don't suck!





Swapped back to Donnies





Sorry for the use of flash - but we were doing some low light listening.

These are the sexy Canadian made Westinghouse 807 speakers with Chinese made ceramic adapters. These tubes were true NOS from the 30s or 40s.  Steve mentioned them in a different thread, and I think he had some out during the last DECFEST. I did a little research, and the 807 is the predecessor to the 6L6, with an anode on the top. So with these adapters, they are easily useable in most 6L6 amps.  We had two sets of these, the set pictured, and a milspec ceramic base that were a little gassy, but solid (supposed NOS). I found a quad in Spain and jumped on them, hoping for the best. They are really nice in the Rachel!





Palomino's backwall diffusers - these are a fractal type, which work OK, but I still think more complex QRD23 would perform better.  ;)
(also - lineup of tubes stuck in foam at the bottom)





Rachel, 807 tubes, Donnie's speakers, and Pal's MAC setup. It was a great day of listening! I was there from about Noon till 6pm I think.

Quote:


Yep, you have to give OB's room to blossom.
I take LR's comment about the looks of my speakers as a real compliment. I spent a huge amount of time and effort to make them look at least passable to me.
I also got lucky in listening to others in this forum so I could pick out quality drivers and where to put them in my baffles.
As I have said before, it was a real eye opening trip. Palo's room and equipment really showed me what is possible. I'm still in awe.

sorry.... whats "CDApS"?
secret club

Sorry.  It stands for Chicago Decware APpreciation Society.   Our mission is furthering the dark art of high fidelity with Decware products as the foundation of our learnings.

It was founded after Lonely Raven and I met at Zenfest a few years ago.  We live about 20 minutes from each other in the Chicago burbs.

We meet on an irregular schedule throughout the year.  Guests like Donnie are welcome any time. Usually we announce each meeting here on the forum.

No set agenda but typically we have a few things in mind for each meeting and equipment comparos are the norm.   It is my personal feeling that these meetings have been instrumental in the development of my room/system.

We rotate meeting location but lately most have been at my house because of my room treatment which is pretty revealing.
 

thats a great idea.  while i have several audio friends that we get together for sessions, we are not into the same type of gear or sound of.  i find the decware gang are more similar in this respect.

Haven't played with that at all. They are literally just speakers countersunk into 3/4" MDF - not even a real base on them or anything, so they were leaning up against other speakers for support.

Now that I know they sound good, and are worth putting an effort into, I'll probably double the thickness of the baffle, and put a base on them that allows me to quickly tilt adjust the angle on the fly.

Thanks for the info about them beaming - that will help me figure out what I'm aiming for (literally LOL)

yeah we didn't play with angle which could have been a factor.  BTW, these drivers also produced impressive bass!

I am thinking of making some prototypes out of MDF to see what that does for me when I mount my drivers in there.  You were 1.5" right?

They felt at least that heavy.

Not that interested in a new mic.  I have tubes to buy (wink wink).

My speakers are made from two .75" thick 4'X8' sheets of MDF glued together.
That means that the material weighed in just under 200lbs!
I roughed out the pieces when they were still .75" thick and doweled the parts together so that they didn't shift when I glued them together.

LR, which Ashley?

Lin

https://www.amazon.com/Ashly-3200-2-Channel-Power-Amplifier/dp/B006R2YRAY

I've plugged it in only to verify it works. While it's got nice horsepower - I'm enjoying the built in DSP of the CLASS-D amps...if not the sound.

Donnie - that would be awesome - feel free to hire me to build you something...I'd love to see how you finish it. But for me, I'm just going to Duratex them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCT8YRkmvSo

Nope, just straight horsepower. Way better sounding than the D-Class amps, but it needs a processed source, or full range speakers.

I don't think it would be 200# of MDF really. Hell, if you bring your OB panels over here, we can do the work in a couple hours in my garage, and I've got a dust collector!

I think your amazing soundstage, really *hearing* the room had something to do with how the monoliths project sound, and how you had your diffusers setup. I'm not sure you can get that same thing with the OBs without *more* diffusers....which you should be doing anyways.  :)

I'm glad to hear your front end is working better - I figured you'd get that sorted out again.

Speaking of diffusers...so I was going through the basement where I had piles of acoustic insulation material stacked up...and in the pile of stuff I found another pair of  foam diffusers in the box! I must have stashed them down there when Michelle moved in (temporarily) got so wrapped up in building diffusers that I forgot how many foam ones I had! So I have yet another pair (non-fractal ones too!) that I need to build a frame for and setup!!

We both need to get crackin on more diffuser builds!

Palo,
I'm betting that one 4'X8' sheet of .75" thick MDF would be more than enough material for your baffles(only 97 pounds!). Cut them out first, it makes it a whole lot easier to handle. Use Tightbond 2 to glue them together. I used a paint roller and hit both sides. I also figured out where the cutouts were going to be in the finished part and used those areas to screw the pieces together in the middle. Don't forget to pilot drill clearance holes on one side or the screw won't pull the pieces together.
I also drilled .375" holes in diagonal corners on my two plys and used some wood dowels to keep the material from floating around while drying.
Are you thinking about offsetting your drivers?
My goodness, what a stream of thought post.

Palo,
The magic numbers are:
Baffle 24" wide
Alpha's on the centerline and 14" up from the bottom
TB's 6" over from the centerline 34" up from the bottom.
All dimensions are to the center of the drivers.
I really don't know if my radiused top helps or not.